


Ship of Theseus Reborn

by Straumoy



Series: Power Girl Short Stories [10]
Category: DC Elseworlds
Genre: Alternate Universe - Superheroes/Superpowers, Family Drama, Philosophy, Superheroes
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-09-23
Updated: 2019-09-23
Packaged: 2020-10-26 17:04:22
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,885
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20745701
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Straumoy/pseuds/Straumoy
Summary: Jon is eager to learn of his heritage and the dynamic his father has with his own family. Although his meeting with his aunt Kara Zor-El went without a hitch, he later learned he has a second aunt. For whatever reason Jon's father told him they would not be visiting her any time soon. Why would his father shut someone out like that? And his own family at that? With curiosity getting the better of him, together with his best friend Damian, the two decide to give his second aunt a surprise visit and get to the heart of the matter.





	Ship of Theseus Reborn

Abott Island, Chicago. Power Girl’s base of operations. Skies above were covered in a thick blanket of grey clouds. A light sizzle of rain leaked down from the heavens. Two small dots showed in the sky, coming down in a steady descent. As they grew closer, they took a more humanoid shape. Not an impossible sight, although a bit rare even in this age of flying beings. What made them stand out was their age, a couple of boys hardly a day older than twelve. One wore an odd mix of casual sneakers and torn jeans with a sweater and flaming red cape. Square across the blue sweater’s chest was a large red S, encased in a yellow shield. His expression was troubled, looking over his shoulder just to reassure himself that they were still in the clear. The other kid was far different, both in clothing and in attitude. Even behind his green domino mask iron-clad will and determination shined through. Underneath his black and yellow cape was a red sleeveless vest. The grey suit underneath ended in sturdy gloves and knee-high boots in matching green. A gust of wind pulled his cape back, revealing a golden R encased in black on his left chest. He held on to his companion since apparently the gift of flight had not been granted to him.

Their landing was soft, almost without a sound even on the crude gravel that covered most of the island. Surrounded by brick buildings who’d not only seen better days but better decades the two kids looked around. Save the sound of rain landing against the many shipping containers that were stacked around, the place had an eerie silence to it. Not even the birds dare sing, let alone call out to one another in this place. The masked kid pulled something out from one of his belt pouches, “This way. Come on.”

“I don’t know, Damian. Maybe,” the other kid started, “maybe we should just go back home. Come back another time. When we have an actual invitation.”

“Oh, give me a break,” Damian said, more focused on his device than his friend. “You’ve been eager to meet her ever since you heard about her from Supergirl.”

“Yeah, but dad said they don’t get along so well.”

Damian stopped and sighed, “I know Jon, I read father’s file. You’re like an open book it hurts just looking at you. You want to meet her, figure out why she and your dad don’t get along and-”

Jon put his hand over Damian’s mouth, a finger raised to his lips. His clear blue eyes were wide and busy, looking from left to right. Seconds dragged on until whatever had Jon spooked faded from his attention. Freed from Jon’s hand, Damian took a look back on his device. Its screen showed no change in status. The three surveillance cameras that had their high definition lenses locked on them had already been dealt with. Dealing with the encrypted signal and accessing the video feed had been easy enough. As for the remaining seventeen cameras, they just had to stay out of their sight until they made it to the entrance. All in all, it was a decent protective measure for your run of the mill place you’d keep secure and monitored. For a superhero’s base of operations however, things simply weren’t up to snuff. Compared to the likes of the Batcave or Fortress of Solitude, this place had all the protection of a thin mist.

They soon found themselves at the entrance. No oversized key for a crystal structure of alien geometry or cave entrance hidden deep in the woods behind a waterfall. Just an ordinary crane that raised and lowered a battered shipping container. Another command on Damian’s device and a progress bar slithered across the screen. Punching through the encrypted lock for the magnetically sealed container would take some time. Jon was still restless, perhaps a little more than usual after whatever it was spooked him. Nevertheless, he stuck by his friend despite his concerns. Just as the lock clicked and the door slid aside, someone somewhere turned up the faucet and the rain came down with a vengeance.

Even after quickly stepping out of the rain inside the container, the two boys still had to take a moment to shake the feeling of the rain. Dozens of tiny little rivers trekked down their capes, leaving a trail of water of the floor. Another command and the crane jolted to life. Its engine tugged away, metal creaked and groaned like an old man forced to leave the comfort of his chair. Rain drummed hard and intense on the container, then it stopped. One of the short ends of the container had been replaced with a window. Through it, they could barely see the city skyline through the low clouds and heavy rain before an old brick wall blocked their view. Their short little ride came to a crude stop, almost throwing them off balance. In the corner diagonal from their entrance a panel slid aside, a silent invitation to come inside.

Damian tucked away his device and pressed on with a determined stride. Jon hesitated before quickly catching up, his hand landing on Damian’s shoulder, “Damian, wait-”

Both of them froze. Half hidden in the shadows from a single lamp stood a woman, tall and strong. Jon had seen that stance a dozen times before. It was very much how Damian’s father, Batman, carried himself. Intimidating, with a calculating cunning simmering just underneath the surface. Batman was many things, a great man by several standards. Respected and even loved by Jon’s parents. Damian himself held him in the highest regard. Yet for all that, Batman was at the end of the day just a man. Jon’s dad was an alien with impossible strength and powers that seemed to defy common science. Yet for all his powers and strength, there was a softness to it all. Kindness and compassion in every word spoken, every action taken. His aunt, Supergirl, was very much in the same ballpark. So, Jon had never really considered what would happen if one took his dad’s strength and spliced it with Batman’s grumpy and defiant attitude. The answer stood in front of him as his second aunt; Power Girl, Kara Zor-L.

A cat meowed and stroked itself against Power Girl’s leg, breaking the silence that lingered between the three of them. Stepping into the light, she was an unflattering sight to behold. Her short blond hair was a mess as if she’d been kicked out of bed just minutes prior. The vibrant blue shade to her eyes was dimmed behind the tired and grumpy gaze that looked like it could cut through titanium. No heat vision required. A washed-out t-shirt that not only had a few holes in it but also looked like it had shrunk in the wash straining to contain her strong arms. Though her ill-fitting sweat pants hid her legs behind a veil of thick folds, it was safe to say they sported an equally impressive physique as her arms. Her bare feet showed cracked nail polish from last week. She raised her chin, a glare in her tired eyes, “Whaddya want?”

“Uhm, aunt… Kara?”

“Speak up kid, I can’t hear for shit. Stupid sawed-off shotgun. Shooting people in the face like that…” her voice faded into inaudible mumbles.

He looked to Damian for support, but only got a shrug. Puffing up his chest, Jon tried again, “Aunt Kara. I’ve come to visit. We don’t mean-”

“Ah, you’re Kal and Lois’ kid?” Kara picked up her cat, paying them no heed. “Heard about that. Diana came by- was it Wednesday?”

“I thought Kryptonians were impervious to damage,” Damian scoffed, shaking his head as if either unimpressed or disappointed.

Kara shot him a look, opting to pet her cat rather than make a fuzz. Still, even her one-eyed cat didn’t seem too fond of Damian’s comment. Or perhaps Kara was just bad at petting. She turned and disappeared into the dark room beyond. Damian was about to follow suit when Jon stopped him with a silent hand on the shoulder. They weren’t welcome. There’d be another time, another day. Jon was here to build bridges, not burn them down before construction had even begun. The two of them was about to take their leave when they heard a voice boom from inside the shadows, distorted by the acoustics of a grand hall, “Well come on in you two, you made it this far haven’t you?!”

Stepping into the shadows, Jon and Damian took a moment to let their eyes adjust to the dim light. Standing on metal railing they looked out on a great room. On the far wall hung monitors by the dozens. Their many video feeds acted as the primary source of light. Even in here there were shipping containers stacked up against the wall and on top of one another. Some of them were only dark silhouettes, licked by the light from the monitors. A few of them had been carved open and transformed into makeshift rooms. Housing desks, computers, weapons of both human and alien design and even makeshift sleeping quarters. Climbing down the stairs to where Kara sat by a central desk at the ground floor, Jon caught sight of a suit. White and sleeveless it hung on a nail to the wall like a discarded snakeskin, a pair of metallic blue high boots stood surprisingly neatly placed underneath. On an ironing table next to the suit hung a piece of red cloth with a string of golden medallions attached to it.

“Kryptonians,” Kara started as she picked up and shook numerous cans of energy drink, only to find them all empty, “develop their powers differently. Perhaps it’s a bit like human athletes; they all have the same muscles, but their performance is still different. Or maybe it’s because of the route we took through space. Who knows?”

“Uhm, aunt Kara? Are you alright?”

Their eyes met for a moment. She gave a mirthless laugh, “No kid. I’m not.”

“Why? Because you got shot in the head?” Damian said. Jon jabbed him in the side with his elbow.

Kara smiled, it was hard to tell with the deep shadows and flickering lights from the screens, but it looked genuine. Scratching her cats head, Kara asked, “Kid, have you ever been in a Turkish prison?”

Without hesitation and a completely straight face, Damian said, “Yes. My mother took me there when I was four. For training.”

Kara’s smile faded; her eyes drifted off to one of the screens. Unlike so many others it didn’t show some camera feed or even the regular news. It showed a movie, a really old one about people talking inside a cockpit. There were no subtitles, the sound was muted. Still, Kara took some enjoyment in watching it. A soft laugh escaped her, “Yeah, I guess that’s to be expected from the son of Batman.”

“Could you tell us what’s bothering you, aunt Kara? Maybe, maybe we can help?” Jon took a step forward.

A hand reached out, brushed a few strains of Jon’s hair out of the way so Kara could see his face more clearly. Her eyes welled up, “Stars above. You’re just like him, huh?”

“Yeah, I get that a lot,” Jon squirmed around a little bashful on the spot. “Aunt Kara? Why don’t you like my dad?”

A moment passed. Kara drew a deep breath and let out a long sigh, slumping back in her chair. It creaked underneath the weight. Lost in thought, her hand ran slow and smooth strokes across the cats back. It purred with bliss, settling in her lap like a pool of water. Pondering in silence it was as if she built her words like a delicate house of cards, one letter at the time. A few times she drew a breath as if to speak, only to deflate in a sigh. Finally, after long minutes she spoke, “He’s not my cousin.”

“Uh… yes he is,” Damian said in a matter of fact tone. Again, Jon nudged him with the elbow.

She straightened in her chair, pushing down on the armrests to shift her weight. Her face strained from the effort, “Ever heard of the Ship of Theseus kid?”

Somehow Damian refrained from doing a full-on facepalm, but the rolling of his eyes was still apparent even with the mask on, “Yes. It is a thought experiment that raises the question of whether an object that has had all of its components replaced remains fundamentally the same object. The concept is one of the oldest in Western philosophy, having been discussed by the likes of Heraclitus and Plato.”

Kara offered the lightest golf clap known to man for Damian’s answer. Shuffling through her desk she fetched a small box filled with plastic bricks. One of Damian’s eyebrows raised doubtfully, “Lego? At your age? Are you serious?”

“If you’d had a normal childhood, you’d know that Lego’s are awesome regardless of age,” Kara said while she continued to build a simple figure in a single color. “There are many proposed solutions to the Ship of Theseus problem. Personally, I think the ‘new’ ship is just as good as the ‘old’ one if done correctly.”

“What do you mean aunt Kara?”

“Everything changes kid. The sands of time slow down for no one, its hands touch everyone,” she started to pluck off pieces from her crude figure and replacing them with identical bricks, just of a different color. Slow and steady, brick by brick. “Until nothing remains of the original, on and on it goes. From cradle to grave.”

“But it’s a new ship,” Damian insisted.

Kara snapped her fingers and pointed at Jon, “How old are you, kid?”

“Twelve. And a half.”

“You know Lois, your mom? She’s human. The thing about humans, it takes them about… ten years for her to replace every single atom in their body with a new one. She eats, drinks, gain and lose weight. Cut her hair, wash her skin, trim her nails. Just having you made her go through massive changes. But despite that, she’s still Lois, right? She’s still daddy’s wife. He’s probably known her for more than ten years. He loves her still, even if she’s not the same woman physically as when they first met. She’s still your mom. The ship is the same.”

“Right, because it happens gradually,” Damian folded his arms over his chest, nodding. “How is Superman different?”

Kara fiddled with her Lego sculpture, now completely rebuilt with a new color. “Kryptonians are different from humans. We take longer to cycle through the atoms that make up our bodies, even more so when we’re charged by a yellow sun. But that’s not enough. The scale is different. Ten years, a hundred thousand years, who cares? As long as the effect is there, the time scale is not that important. Superman isn’t my cousin because the change is too big, too sudden.”

The sculpture broke in Kara’s hand and faster than a speeding bullet, it got reassembled. While retaining the same shape and design, its color was no longer uniform. She’d still used only two colors, the original and the new. But now they were mixed, interchanged. Patches of either color, big and small dotted the sculpture. Putting it aside on her desk, Kara turned her attention to the two boys, “So I treat him as he should be treated; an imposter who’s taken the place of the man I admired the most. And the world doesn’t care. He can have the same smile, the laugh, the suit, and those dazzling blue eyes. But he’s not Kal. Not the Kal I knew.”

“But-”

“No buts!” the sudden outburst cracked through the hall like the angry roar of a gun. Faced with the wide-eyed shock on Jon’s face, Kara slumped back in her chair. Shame and regret hung over her shoulders like a coat too big and too heavy for her frame. A blinking red light caught her eye. Fingers found a keyboard, commands got typed in with an absentminded indifference. All the screens shifted their display, melding into one massive screen. The silhouette of a figure, a man hovered in the air against the grey clouds above. His large cape billowed in the wind. Every once in a while, something black and almost sinister swatted by, like a shadow that had escaped some nightmare. “Time to go, home kid. Dinner’s getting cold.”

Jon and Damian retraced their steps up the stairs. Looking back down into the large hall, Jon saw his aunt still sitting by her desk alone. Somewhere along with their talk, the cat had taken off to who knows where. Even with his supervision, he found it hard to judge her expression. Lost in silent thought, she kept on staring at the screen, at the silhouette. Damian tugged at his cape, urging him to come along. Their luck was running on fumes at this point. A ball of emotion swelled in his throat, Jon puffed his chest, the S broadening to its fullest before he called out, “Bye, bye aunt Kara!”

“Yeah, take care of yourself, Jon.”


End file.
